# Contacts: customers, suppliers, dues and statements

> How NegoBill keeps customers and suppliers: one contact can be a customer, a supplier or both, wholesale is a setting on it, every credit sale adds to dues, payments settle the oldest bills first, a statement can be printed or shared on WhatsApp, and opening balances import from Excel. Web, Android and iOS.

- Product: NegoBill V5 (https://negobill.com) · Module: CONTACTS
- Platforms: web app (app.negobill.com), Android app, iOS app
- Plans: Every plan; the ledger statement from Plus
- Permissions: Contacts & groups group: CONTACT:manage; Ledger & payments for statements and settlements
- How-to guides: https://negobill.com/help/add-a-customer, https://negobill.com/help/record-a-payment, https://negobill.com/help/send-a-statement
- Updated: 2026-09-26 · Page: https://negobill.com/manual/contacts · Markdown: https://negobill.com/manual/contacts.md

## Where it is

- **Web:** Contacts in the top of the menu: the list sorted by what is owed (collections order), search by any word, the contact page (relationship: sales, receipts, statement, actions in the header), groups.
- **Android and iOS:** the Contacts tab; a contact opens to its dues, sales and actions; the sale screen's customer bar searches and adds contacts in place.

## Plan and permission

Every plan. Staff need Contacts & groups to add or edit; Ledger & payments to record money or read statements.

## What a contact is

- A person or business with a name and/or a phone number (digits only, the country code from the store's country), optional business name, email, GSTIN, address with the state chosen from the list, a note, groups.
- **Roles:** Customer, Supplier, or both. Staff is a third role added when a customer is hired.
- **Wholesale** is a setting on the contact: wholesale customers get the wholesale price on sales.
- **Dues:** every credit sale adds to the customer's dues; every receipt settles the oldest open bills first; the contact shows what is owed now, on the list and on every sale's customer chip.

## Actions

**Add a contact:** Contacts → Add, or from any contact search ("+ New contact" at the foot, role preset from the surface, picked at once). A name or a phone is enough.

**Record money received:** on the contact or on a sale: amount, payment method, note; against one bill or against the account oldest-first. Received cash / Paid cash beyond the bills stays on the contact as an advance or a payable; either can be voided.

**Statement:** the ledger statement of the contact with a running balance (positive = they owe the shop, negative = the shop owes them); the detailed statement shows line notes; printed on A4 or shared. The payment-due box never splits across pages.

**Opening balances:** Contacts → Import with an opening balance column: each becomes an Opening Balance document in the ledger (equity, not revenue); receipts and vouchers settle it oldest-first with real bills; duplicate rows say their balance did not land.

**Groups:** the same tree as products; file contacts in bulk.

## Rules

- Contact search matches any word of the name, nickname, business, trade or contact person; digits match a phone prefix.
- A contact becomes staff by adding the Staff role; only an existing staff member is refused.
- The contact list is a server search built for 50,000 contacts: paged, never listed whole.
- "Ledger" and "statement" are the words; never "khata".

## Limits

Name up to 300 characters, business name 500, note 300; imports 500 rows a chunk, tested at 10,000 rows.